Ride It (Geri Halliwell song)

"Ride It" is a song recorded by English singer Geri Halliwell for her third studio album, Passion (2005). It was released on 22 November 2004 by Innocent Records as the first single from the album.

Chart performance

Strong competition from Girls Aloud, Destiny's Child and Lemar resulted in a final chart position of number four in the UK Singles Chart, from a midweek position of number two, with 19,196 copies sold in its first week. "Ride It" went on to sell 55,142 copies and became the 143rd best selling single of 2004.

Music video

The accompanying music video for the song was directed by Luca Tommassini. In it, Halliwell dresses as a policegirl and spanks a male model with a truncheon before flashing her bra. She also sticks the truncheon between the man's legs. There is also a close-up of lifting her pink dress and shaking her bottom. TV executives were worried the video would be too sexual for Top of the Pops Saturday viewers, which was watched by six to 12 year olds. The BBC then censored the video, saying: "TOTP Saturday will air Geri's video without a couple of unsuitable shots". Music executive Simon Cowell also criticized the single's music video on ITV's CD:UK saying, "If I was her record label and that video arrived on my desk I would throw it in the bin". In response, Halliwell wrote to Cowell demanding an explanation for his outburst as well as an apology.

Sean Paul

Sean Paul Ryan Francis Henriques (born 9 January 1973), known simply as Sean Paul, is a Jamaican dancehall ragga hip hop recording artist, musician, producer and actor.

Life and career

1973–1996: Early life

Sean Paul was born in Kingston, Jamaica to parents Garth and Frances, both of whom were talented athletes. His mother is a well-known painter. His paternal grandfather had Sephardi Jewish ancestry, from a family that had emigrated from Portugal, and his paternal grandmother was Afro-Caribbean; his mother is of English and Chinese Jamaican descent. Sean Paul was raised as a Catholic, though aware that his grandfather came from an old respected Jamaican Jewish family. Many members of his family are swimmers. His grandfather was on the first Jamaican men's national water polo team. His father also played water polo for the team in the 1960s, and competed in long-distance swimming, while Sean Paul's mother was a backstroke swimmer. Sean Paul played for the national water polo team from the age of 13 to 21, when he gave up the sport in order to launch his musical career. He attended Wolmer's Boys' School and the College of Arts, Science, and Technology, now known as the University of Technology, where he was trained in commerce with an aim of pursuing an occupation in hotel management.